Hydrides, compounds in which metals or metalloids are bound directly to hydrogen, are relatively energetic molecules with a large variety of known and developing applications in chemistry and energy technology. Such applications include uses as reducing agents, hydrogenation catalysts, desiccants, potent bases, components in rechargeable batteries, and potentially as solid hydrogen storage vehicles in fuel cell technology.
Metal nanoparticles, particles of elemental metal in pure or alloyed form with a dimension less than 100 nm, have unique physical, chemical, electrical, magnetic, optical, and other properties in comparison to their corresponding bulk metals. As such they are in use or under development in fields such as chemistry, medicine, energy, and advanced electronics, among others.
Synthetic methods for metallic nanoparticles are typically characterized as being “top-down” or “bottom-up” and comprise a variety of chemical, physical, and even biological approaches. Top-down techniques involve the physical breakdown of macroscale metallic particles, using a variety of energy inputs, into nanoscale particles. Bottom-up methods involve the formation of nanoparticles from isolated atoms, molecules, or clusters.
Physical force methods for top-down metal nanoparticle synthesis have included milling of macroscale metal particles, laser ablation of macroscale metals, and spark erosion of macroscale metals. Chemical approaches to bottom-up synthesis commonly involve the reduction of metal salt to zero-valent metallic element with nucleation seed particles or self-nucleation and growth into metal nanoparticles.
While each of these methods can be effective in certain circumstances, each also has disadvantages or situational inapplicability. Direct milling methods can be limited in the size of particles obtainable (production of particles smaller than ˜20 nm is often difficult) and can lead to loss of control of the stoichiometric ratios of alloys. Other physical methods can be expensive or otherwise unamenable to industrial scale. On the other hand, chemical reduction techniques can fail, for example in situations where metallic cations are resistant to chemical reduction. Mn(II) for example is virtually impervious to in situ chemical reduction, making this approach inapplicable to the preparation containing Mn0, or Mn0-containing, nanoparticles.
Non-metallic nanoparticles have been generally less well studied than metal nanoparticles, but techniques for synthesizing them have been developed in certain situations. Similar to metal nanoparticles, non-metallic nanoparticles also have spectroscopic and other properties differing substantially from those of the bulk elements, such as the fluorescence of carbon nanoparticles.
A single synthetic methodology, capable of producing high-purity elemental nanoparticles of any composition, whether metal, metalloid, or non-metal would be useful.